Comfort And Joy
by Minnow
Summary: Sex, dysfunctional Black family. (Sirius x Remus)


**Comfort and Joy  
****By Minnow**

**Disclaimer:** These characters belong to J.K. Rowling and various publishers and corporations.  
**Summary**: Sex, dysfunctional Blacks.  
**Pairing**: Remus/Sirius  
**Era**: MWPP  
**Rating**: R  
**Dedication:** S-Star likes it! babbles incoherently She really does! This one is for you, sweetie.

**Comfort and Joy **

It starts with the full moon: none of them really know Remus until they have actually witnessed the transformation, the wolf running in the forest with the moonlight rippling through its thick pelt. Now, they have seen how the change bends and breaks and batters their friend's thin body, and nothing is going to be the same again.

It starts with the Blacks. They are not cruel in ways that one can categorise easily. Mild physical abuse, perhaps: Mr. Black beats his sons when he thinks they deserve it. Rather stronger emotional abuse: Mrs. Black is quick to let Sirius know he is far from being the favourite son. The main problem, though, isn't so clear-cut: the Blacks are the Blacks, and Sirius is Sirius, and by some genetic quirk he just isn't one of the family. And the family fear and resent him for being so different.

Sirius has spent his life trying to skate on the surface, to take things lightly and easily, be as flippant as possible, even cruel: cruel, because he is a Black, after all, and the rest because he seriously wants to piss off the Blacks.

But he is horrified, quite against his will, by the changes Remus has to endure every month. The first morning as Padfoot, he lies beside his friend's injured and aching body, whining in distress, licking Remus's face to offer what tiny bit of comfort he can.

That same morning, he arrives late to breakfast to discover a letter from his parents beside the empty plate at his place. His mother is spiralling out of control, but the family won't acknowledge that she is in fact borderline psychotic, has very little grip on reality.

_Sirius,_ she writes, _had I known how you would turn out, I would have aborted you the moment I found I was pregnant. I wish you had never been born._

Sirius crumples up the thin, expensive parchment, slips it into the pocket of his robes, says nothing. He even manages to eat a few mouthfuls of toast.

At lunch, Remus is already back from the hospital wing, sitting in his usual place and waiting eagerly for his friends. When Sirius slips into the seat next to him, Remus squeezes his hand and whispers, 'Thank you. The Animagus thing. It's beyond wonderful.'

It's probably just because of that letter, but for a second Sirius imagines that he needs to blink back tears from his eyes. 'It's okay. That's what friends are for, right?'

In Herbology, Sirius senses Remus glancing at him from time to time, tense, his brow furrowed. Sirius tries to ignore him, concentrates very hard on scraping the poison from belladonna leaves so they can be used for potions. He lingers after the lesson, takes his time removing the protective gloves, putting away his instruments. But Remus waits behind for him. 'You all right?'

Surprised, Sirius says, 'Yeah. Great. Why?'

'It's just that – ' Remus hesitates. 'After the full moon. I can, sort of, sense things. You seemed upset.'

It isn't like Remus either to volunteer personal information or solicit it. Sirius impulsively takes the crumpled letter out of his robes, smoothes it out, hands it over without a word. The thick black ink, the mad, confident strokes of the pen… Sirius shudders, without even knowing he does.

Remus reads it, reads again, frowns more deeply. He doesn't say anything: what can he say? He puts his arms round Sirius, hugs him fiercely, tries, Sirius thinks, to infuse him with some of his own courage in the face of personal entropy, the chaos that overwhelms Remus every month. Sirius needs to undergo the loss of family only once, though once is probably no less painful in the scale of checks and balances.

Clumsily, Sirius puts his own arms round Remus for a moment. They pat each other's backs awkwardly, break away, laughing a bit shakily. 'I'm sorry,' Remus says, and Sirius doesn't know whether he means the hug or the letter.

'Not a problem.'

Another month, another full moon. The nights are easier, but the transformations aren't; it's a bad morning, and Remus lies motionless on the bed in the Shrieking Shack, not too badly cut but obviously in great pain.

Sirius stays behind, waving the other two away. 'I'll hide when Pomfrey comes.'

He transforms back into Padfoot, lies down beside Remus, trying to warm him as much as he can. It's a cold morning, and they never dare light a fire in case they're found out.

Remus stirs and puts his arms round Padfoot. Padfoot licks him. Remus hides his face in Padfoot's fur, murmuring whatever soft endearments he murmurs to the dog; the part of Sirius conscious in the dog's body isn't quite sure he should be listening. After all, what Remus says to Padfoot is none of his business.

Sirius transforms into himself again. Remus is dozing, his arms still around the space where Padfoot was and Sirius is now. He's holding the other boy tight, and Sirius finds it comforting. He hopes that Remus finds him, and Padfoot, as comforting.

'Sirius? You should have gone,' Remus murmurs in his friend's ear.

Sirius jumps. 'I thought you were asleep! No, I thought I'd stay till Pomfrey came. See you were okay.'

'I am okay. But it's good to have someone here.'

That's another huge admission coming from Remus. Sirius isn't quite sure how to take it, so he reciprocates in kind, with a confidence of his own.

'I had a letter again yesterday. She said that she must have been impregnated by the devil, and I should be put down.'

Remus tries to sit up, alarmed. 'You didn't tell me.'

'Shh, lie down. Didn't want to bother you with it just before the moon. She's right, Moony. My father probably is the devil.' Sirius tries to laugh, but it comes out sounding all wrong.

'Poor Padfoot.' Remus snuggles closer to him. 'You'll be of age soon, and then you can leave.'

'Not for another year.'

'But it's still something to hang on to.'

'It is,' Sirius agrees. He thinks that Remus is also something to hang on to. He hugs him back, feeling warmer, even a bit dizzy. But then, they none of them slept much the night before. He thinks he might like to kiss Remus, not in any weird perverted way, but just as a friend. So he buries his face in Remus's hair, letting his lips graze Remus's forehead. Remus doesn't push him away.

He feels safe and even good, better than he's felt for quite a while. He closes his eyes and lets himself relax in the circle of Remus's arms. He's vaguely aroused, but that's pleasant too, and it's nice just to lie here quietly, listening to Remus's even breathing, waiting until the last second until he has to get up and squeeze himself into the small cupboard that's the only decent hiding-place in the Shack.

Back at school, James is there in History of Magic, and he and Sirius exchange notes about a prank they're planning, to extend Snivellus's already oversized nose. Operation Cyrano, James has christened it. Then, at lunchtime, Remus is still in the infirmary, so Sirius mentions the letters. Well, James is his best friend. Only fair that he should know too.

James is alarmed, tells Sirius to come and stay at the Potters', and they go off on a tangent, discussing various makes of broomstick and how to create a home Quidditch pitch when you're not allowed to use magic.

At night, Sirius lies awake, thinking about his mother's letters. _You unnatural creature… You are no part of me or your father. You are no part of this family._

Remus is back in the dorm, sleeping peacefully in the bed next to Sirius's. On an impulse, Sirius creeps out of his own bed, into Remus's, cuddles up close to him with his arms lightly round him. He knows Remus won't mind; if he even wakes. They've shared a bed quite often in the past, when Remus has been plagued by nightmares before the moon.

Remus stirs, mumbles something, relaxes back into sleep. Against his warm body, with the scent of shampoo and soap and an orangey, citrus, Remus smell, Sirius falls into what could be termed a blissful sleep.

He dreams about lying next to Remus, burrowing up to his pack mate and the dream is as satisfying as the reality, more so; in the dream, he experiences that wonderful tightening of his groin that means he's about to have an orgasm, and he moans and pushes in closer to Remus's wonderful heat; and wakes up coming, crying out something, but he's not sure what.

His whole body feels silky and sated; he doesn't really want to move, but he'll have to in a minute, because his pyjamas will be uncomfortably clammy, and the last thing he wants is for Remus to wake up and deduce what he's been doing. He fishes out Remus's wand, which is always under his pillow, carefully so as not to rouse his friend. He knows that Remus's wand works fine for him; he's borrowed it a couple of times. He casts a quick cleaning spell, replaces the wand and drifts back to sleep, still curled close to Remus.

He's so tired he doesn't wake when the alarm goes; he doesn't wake when James and Peter clatter out of the dorm, James calling back loudly, 'Get up, you lazy buggers, or you'll be late for school!' assuming, naturally, that everyone is in their own beds.

He doesn't wake till Remus pokes him in the ribs and asks, 'What're you doing in my bed? Did I have a nightmare?'

'No. No nightmares.' Sirius smiles a bit, because he still feels lazy and warm, and rolls against Remus. Remus tries to turn away; Sirius can sense his anxiety, probably because he's hard too and doesn't want Sirius to notice. Well, it's first thing in the morning, after all.

But Sirius captures his wrist, pulls him back, puts his face close to Remus's, all but nuzzling him. 'Don't you want to?'

'Want to what?' Sirius can feel Remus's face flushing, hot beneath his lips.

'To come. To get off.'

Remus makes a choking sound, and Sirius laughs soundlessly against his ear. 'It's okay. S'not any big sex thing. Just to feel good. You know. To make everything go away for a minute. Otherwise you'll just have to get up and wank in the loo, and it'll be cold.'

'If you do too,' Remus mutters, still scarlet, keeping his face tucked out of view.

In response, Sirius presses his body fiercely against his friend's, holding him as tightly as he can, and after a moment Remus is clutching him, than jerking his hips against Sirius's and muttering something Sirius can't make out, mainly because he is also being swept away on the wonderful tide of sensation that blots out all other awareness.

They lie together for a few minutes, still clinging to each other. 'D'you do this with…with James?' Remus asks, in the mock-casual voice that means he is very, very nervous about the answer.

'No. Before you ask, it just hasn't, uh, arisen.'

Remus snorts.

Sirius knows that Remus yearns to keep things simple, because the mechanics of lycanthropy make his life so complex, require such eternal vigilance. He hopes that Remus too will understand the beautiful simplicity, the finiteness of the act, not worry over it all day the way he sometimes worries his thumbnail, pulling and chewing on it with intense concentration.

'You're not going to brood about it, are you, Moony?' He's anxious, in spite of himself.

'No. We'd better get up, we'll miss breakfast.' Remus grabs his wand and does the cleaning spell. 'You used my wand, didn't you?' he asks suspiciously.

It's Sirius's turn to blush. 'Well, er, yes. Didn't have mine. How d'you know?'

'It feels different.'

As he pulls on his robes, inside-out at first in his haste, till Remus points that out to him, Sirius ponders that he should probably be doing stuff like this with a girl. A purebred girl, to delight his singularly implacable family. But then he thinks how difficult a girl would be, how a girl would completely obviate the point. A girl would need to be dated and talked to and learned, the way he doesn't have to learn a best friend he's lived with for nearly five years. A girl would want this to mean something.

With impeccable timing, the owls have left another letter this morning. As Remus and Sirius run into the Great Hall, very late indeed, it is waiting at Sirius's place, a scroll of the finest parchment sealed with the Black family crest.

'Sorry, mate,' James says helplessly. Then, with an authority that Remus, the prefect, sadly lacks, he says, 'Don't read it, Padfoot. Give it to me and I'll incendio the bloody thing.'

But Sirius is already tearing it open, not so much breaking the seal as pulverising it.

This one is from his father. _Your mother has had to go away for a few days, to rest_, he writes. _This is entirely your fault: she has been angered by your lack of response to any of her owls. What an ungrateful son you are; if you can be called my son in any way other than blood. However, blood is sacred to a Black, so you will be given one more chance…._

'Not as bad as usual,' Sirius says into the silence. Remus and James are both staring at him, though Peter, oblivious, is messing about with a large bowl of porridge, pouring both sugar and honey on to it.

'She's been taken away,' Sirius explains to their blank faces. 'She's actually a bit nuts, you know. Though nobody'll talk about it. So sometimes she goes for a sort of rest cure. That's what they call it. It's a very expensive nursing home. Where they feed her a lot of potions that probably aren't really legal. And when she comes home, she isn't quite so -- so angry.'

He glances, despite himself, at the Slytherin table, where Regulus has just carefully folded what is probably an almost identical letter, without the reprimands.

While Mrs Black is away, while the moon is waning, the days slip by peacefully, marked by lessons and new charms to learn, by reminders that it's OWL year, by homework and meals, a routine that at least two of the Gryffindor Fifth Years welcome, embrace even. It's good to come down to breakfast and not find an owl hovering or a letter at your place; it's good to go to bed knowing that your body won't, that evening, be torn and wrenched from within by a wild creature.

But the nights themselves are complicated. Remus, in spite of his iron will, has at least three nightmares a month, because his unconscious terrors are way beyond even his control. Sirius, in spite of the wonderful silence emanating from the House of Black, still lies awake till three or four in the morning, tossing and turning until his bedclothes are a wreck and sleep further away than ever.

All he wants, all he really wants, is to slip into Remus's bed and burrow close to him, as close as he can to Remus's warmth; his angles are hard, not feminine and yielding, but there is a gentleness all the same to both of them when they are snuggled into each other, seeking and finding their particular brand of solace.

Remus is usually awake when the floorboard by his bed creaks faintly, and Sirius murmurs, 'Budge over, Moony.' It's an effort to keep his eyes open for more than five seconds after lights out, but he makes the effort because the act may be simple and finite, as Sirius posits, but it's also quite addictive. While Mrs. Black sups on illegal potions that curl her bad dreams into beautiful visions, Remus and her son discover that once you start on a course of action you can't always stop.

Sirius has the beautiful visions too, the ones that go with orgasms; the ones that go with orgasms when you really love someone, the way he loves his friend and schoolmate. He always has loved Remus, just as he loves James and, to a lesser extent, Peter. So what's the difference between loving someone as a friend and loving them physically? Not a whole lot; not a big deal.

They've begun to kiss each other now; that's the biggest step, because it requires a certain effort that just getting off does not: it implies an intimacy that goes beyond the mechanics of purely genital sex. Orgasms can be solitary or social, but kissing can only ever involve two people. Even when they tentatively touch each other, even when they are naked and pressed against each other, they are not quite as close as when their lips and tongues meet and they explore each other's mouths, tenderly at first and then more roughly.

It's the kissing that perhaps takes the edge off the simplicity and blurs things a bit. The tidy days start to fly away with the two boys, leaving them breathless and gasping as they chase from one lesson to another, never quite on time, though there is no concrete reason for their lateness. Remus dropped his books, perhaps, because the moon is waxing again and he is getting a bit clumsy. Sirius has an owl from his father to let him know that Mrs. Black will home by Christmas. Possibly they stop to help each other for a beat too long, and that beat will turn into a furtive glance, and if their eyes meet they will smile and look at each other for a full minute before turning and looking away.

James is suddenly a bit petulant, a bit childish and demanding. He wouldn't suspect anything, but of course he must notice that Sirius has changed. Not that Sirius has lost interest in pranks: quite the reverse, in fact. He's more enthusiastic than ever, frenetic even, coming up with wilder and wilder ideas, egging James on to greater feats of Snivellus-baiting.

Perhaps this is to mask the fact that he is actually spending far less time with James. Operation Cyrano was a reasonable success, though it did result in several detentions. But it was flawed. 'You couldn't really tell that Snape's nose was any bigger,' as Peter pointed out.

Sirius has now started propounding a wonderful idea to turn all Slytherins into guinea pigs with a very simple Transfiguration spell; simple to James and Sirius, that is, if to nobody else. The worry is that James will notice how little his best friend is actually concentrating on the details, the fine print that Remus always insists on perusing. He's just suggesting plans for the sake of it. His attention is elsewhere.

James waits in the common room one evening until everyone else has gone to bed, then confronts Sirius. 'What's wrong, Padfoot? You've been completely out of it. Has she started writing again?'

Sirius is touched by his concern, a bit guilty. 'No. But they're expecting me home for Christmas. It's going to be horrendous.'

No doubt it will. Even a temporarily sedated and tamed Mrs Black is dangerous, can pounce at any time, can rip and eviscerate with her words and leave the holiday in shreds all around her. Or rather, all around Sirius, who will be left in the middle of the carnage while the rest of his family move on.

The last full moon of term comes and goes. The infirmary is decorated for Christmas, with a tree, gold and silver chains and twinkling, multicoloured lights like tiny stars, enchanted so that they won't disturb the patients. Sirius goes up to see Remus, lies on the bed next to him absent-mindedly stroking his hair, silky, smooth hair the colour of a lion's mane, hair you could get lost dreaming about, the way Remus is lost in sleep; so far away, but Sirius sometimes thinks that nobody, nothing will ever be so connected to him.

Madam Pomfrey, scandalised, chases him out, but not before Sirius has had the pleasure of seeing Remus open his wide eyes briefly and give him a tiny, intimate smile before falling back to sleep again.

The final Hogsmeade visit before the holidays, and the shops are blaring out wizarding and Muggle carols, _God Rest Ye Merry Hippogriffs_ with its familiar tidings of comfort and joy. The chorus reminds Sirius strongly of those nights in Remus's bed, and his ears suddenly go hot as he queues at the till to pay for his sugar quills.

He knows that whatever horrors he has to handle over the holidays, whatever punishments his family mete out in months to come, he will manage, as long as he has the solace of a tawny-haired boy with a soft voice, and softer skin, marred only by one long scar. 'That's where I was bitten,' Remus has explained. 'You can't cure that one with magic.'

He comes out of Honeydukes clutching his bags of sweets, and goes to find his friends, who're waiting for him outside the Three Broomsticks. As they go inside, he takes Remus's arm, just a casual gesture, and Remus leans in towards him, almost imperceptibly. For a moment, Sirius feels light-headed and Christmassy and quite ridiculously happy.

**End**


End file.
